Fighting against "LGBT-free zones" in Poland

Hate and violence against LGBT+ people in Poland have reached a boiling point. Polish politicians have declared LGBT+ people "enemies of the state" and denounce them as "an ideology". And around 100 Polish municipalities have declared themselves "LGBT-free zones."

That's why more than 340,000 All Out members joined forces and signed our petition to the European Commission.

And in September 2020, All Out's Executive Director Matt Beard went to Brussels and, together with Marcin Rodzinka from KPH, our Polish partner group, delivered the signatures to the EU Commissioner for Equality, Helena Dalli.

 

 

 

 

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Together with our partners at @kph_official, today we delivered over 340K signatures to the EU Commission asking for action on the “LGBT-free” zones in Poland.The petition also represents a message of love and solidarity from across the world to the LGBT+ community in Poland: we hear you and we will stand with you. 💕🌈🇵🇱 #lgbt #weareallout #lgbtrights #lgbtfreezones

A post shared by All Out (@weareallout) on Sep 22, 2020 at 1:59pm PDT

But we wanted to really make sure the EU couldn't ignore this message.

So we came back in the evening and lit up the headquarters of the European Commission with a massive projection.

Watch the video of the projection here:

Our message was picked up by the media around the world. Sky News (see Matt's interview in the video below), Bloomberg, EuroNews, Deutsche Welle, Dazed Magazine, and many others picked up the story. 

And when a former Polish Prime Minister and many other high-ranking Polish politicians found out about the projection and started talking about it, Polish media brought the images of the action to screens and TV sets all across Poland – we even made it to the major national news broadcast. 

 

 

 

 

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All Out's Executive Director Matt Beard gave an extensive interview to @skynews this morning about the situation of LGBT+ people in Poland and the delivery of over 330,000 signatures from all around the world, demanding the EU to take action against the "LGBT-free zones" in the country.

A post shared by All Out (@weareallout) on Sep 25, 2020 at 8:59am PDT

The fight against "LGBT-free zones" in Poland is not over, but our message has been heard.

Feeling inspired? Join our ranks as an Equality Champion and help All Out continue to fight for love and equality.